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Message: [QUOTE="orangepassion, post: 4046352, member: 14"] Going into this game, Syracuse was coming off a bye while Louisville was coming off a very physical, hard fought game against Clemson with a hurt QB. One would think this would be a big advantage for us. However, the opposite was true-It looked like we were the ones coming off a physical game and they appeared energetic and much more physical: [LIST] [*] I lost count of how many times our defenders were dragged for significant yardage down the field, but it was many [*]Rarely did the 1st point of contact make the tackle-That was true on both Defense and Special teams. [*]The cliche "they wanted it more than us" is overused, but it appeared that way yesterday [*]We looked like we hadn't practiced in 2 weeks [*]Everyone in the stadium knows we're running it every 1st down, usually with Tucker-Zero creativity on offense. I keep waiting for us to actually give the ball to guy running in motion for a jet sweep, but it appears that we have Shrader run it up in the middle every time in that scenario [*]Our passes were generally short and horizontal. Defenses have no reason to fear the deep pass and are selling out on the run, as they should. It doesn't appear the staff has any confidence in Shrader to throw deep [*]We continue to get several 15 yard penalties a game. Shrader seems to only draw our OL offsides with the claps/fake hikes prior to the snap [/LIST] However, what upset me most was not how bad we played. What upset me most is it appeared Dino gave up at halftime. For whatever reason, It seemed the gameplan going into the second half was to continue running the ball and milk the clock as much as possible. That could be a good strategy when you are up 28 points, but not when you are down by that amount. We literally just missed having the play clock expire on several plays in the second half and on basically every play took 30 seconds or more. It appeared to me that Dino was more concerned about not letting the score get much worse than trying to win the game. I know it would have been difficult and unlikely for us to come back, but I've witnessed crazier comebacks as a fan with less time to do it. It was demoralizing to me as a fan and brought back memories of the Pitt game 2 years ago when he gave up and refused to use any of his timeouts. What's even more bizarre was in spite of trying to milk the clock as much as possible, he left Shrader and Tucker in till the very end, even after it was impossible to come back. Sometimes it feels to me that he's more concerned with stats, such as having Tucker break the record and be one of the leading rushers in the country than winning. I hope he is asked about these things, but haven't noticed much talk about it. I want to believe in him, but he really lost a lot of my faith with the way he conducted the second half. [/QUOTE]

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